Unilateral?

Steven Den Beste:

". . .A lot of those nations, both Gang-of-8 and Vilnius-group, are in Iraq, helping us: Bulgaria, Czechia, Denmark, Estonia, Hungary, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, the Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, and Spain have boots on the ground. I was particularly surprised by how large the Netherlands contingent was (and I offer my thanks).

"Of course, the UK has the second biggest presence after our own. Australia's not listed, but they were there for the invasion. But I'm surprised and pleased to see that New Zealand's there. (Maybe there's hope for the anglosphere yet. Hello, Toronto? Care to get back into the game and make it five of five?)

"Also Dominica, El Salvador, Honduras and Nicaragua (!) are in, collectively providing some 1140 troops who are operating with the Spanish.

"You also got Azerbaijan, Moldova, Georgia, Kazakhstan, the Philippines, South Korea, Thailand, Macedonia, Ukraine.

"The largest contingents come from Italy (3000), Poland (2400), Ukraine (1640), Spain (1300) and the Netherlands (1106). All told it's more than 15,000 troops, in addition to those sent by the US and UK.

". . .Actually, the number of nations who are participating, and the total number of troops involved, is surprisingly large. Considering all the rhetoric about unilateralism and lack of support by the world, you sure wouldn't have expected such a list. Why hasn't this gotten more publicity?

". . .If I didn't know better, it would almost look... multilateral. Like friends and allies or something. Like support."

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